The Rose Garden

‘Oh, I don’t know. There’d still be some who’d swoon.’

‘But not yourself.’ His tone was sure. ‘My brother did remark upon the fact that you did seem unmoved by all his charms.’

‘Was it a blow to his confidence?’

‘Likely. Though he claimed that his purpose in telling me was to set my mind at ease, for his own mind has leapt to a certain conclusion since he did discover you in my bed.’

I wasn’t used to the dark light of mischief that flared in his eyes, and not knowing him well enough to know the way to respond to his flirting, I treated it lightly.

‘Well, at least it won’t happen again. Fergal’s given me padlocks.’

‘Has he now? Thoughtful man.’ He’d have said something else, but a sound from the road to the back of Trelowarth distracted us both – the hard clop of a horse’s hooves, coming along at a purposeful trot.

Daniel motioned me to step towards him and I didn’t argue, knowing that his size and strength, together with the sword he carried, would give me protection. It was not his sword he reached for, though. Instead he took the dagger from his belt and held it as he’d held it that first day I’d faced him in the study, with the blade all but concealed within his hand.

His other arm he offered to me as the rider came in view and I could see that it was not the constable, only an ordinary man on a high-stepping grey horse. I felt relief, but Daniel didn’t drop his guard. ‘Stay beside me.’

As we climbed the short slope of the hill towards the house, the rider turned the grey horse off the road into the side yard, and dismounted. From that distance I could only see that he was lean and wearing a white wig beneath his hat, and that his clothes looked to be fancier than those I’d seen here so far. This impression grew stronger the closer I got to him, and owed as much to the fabric his clothes had been cut from as to their design. His long jacket was dark-green brocade, with an elegant sheen to it, and his high boots were so gleamingly black that they looked as if they’d hardly been worn.

But his face, when he turned, was plain-featured and didn’t quite match the effect.

He ignored me completely, and nodded a greeting to Daniel. ‘Good morrow. I wonder if I might impose on your kindness. My horse has a shoe loose.’ The accent was hard to place. Scottish, I guessed, though it held a faint trace of the Continent.

I could feel Daniel’s shoulders relaxing. He said, ‘’Tis a dangerous road.’

‘So I’m told.’

For a moment the men faced each other and waited, and then the newcomer offered his hand with a smile. ‘The name is Wilson, Mr Butler, and I do bring with me the good wishes of our mutual acquaintance.’

‘I am glad to have them, Mr Wilson.’ Daniel sheathed the dagger in his belt so neatly that another person watching would have missed the motion altogether and not even known that he’d been holding it. He shook the stranger’s hand and, looking up the empty road, he asked, ‘You travel on your own?’

‘I did arrive with my man yesterday. We took rooms at the inn at St Non’s, and I charged him to stay there and wait while I came on alone to you here.’ He had noticed me finally. His eyes held polite expectation as he looked at Daniel and waited.

‘Forgive me,’ said Daniel, as though it had been an oversight and not protective instinct that had kept him from bringing me forward. ‘Mistress Eva O’Cleary, a guest of my house.’

Wilson bowed. ‘Mistress O’Cleary, your servant.’

I wasn’t sure how to respond, so I did what I’d seen women do in the movies – I made a deep curtsy, and hoped that was right.

To my relief, Wilson turned back to Daniel and asked, ‘May I stable my horse?’

‘In the back.’

There was nothing uneven at all in the horse’s gait, confirming my impression that his mention of a loose shoe had been part of a script, as had Daniel’s reply – like two spies trading passwords to make themselves known to each other.

I guessed, too, that their ‘mutual friend’ was most likely James Butler, the 2nd Duke of Ormonde, who according to the reading I’d done earlier would still be in England, waiting to learn what the House of Lords would do in answer to the charges brought against him of High Treason. He would be impeached, I knew. And soon. But no one here was yet aware of that.

‘How fares our friend?’ asked Daniel.

Wilson, if in fact that was his name, was walking several steps ahead of us, the horse’s bridle in his hand. ‘He is quite well, though incidents of late have tried his patience, as you likely can imagine. It has been suggested to him he might seek to cure his restlessness with travel.’

‘If he has a mind to travel he has but to say the word and I will put my ship and crew at his disposal.’

‘’Tis most kind,’ said Wilson with a nod of thanks, ‘I will be sure to tell him so when next I see him.’

Trailing silently behind, still holding Daniel’s arm, I tried to remember if any of the historical sources I’d read in my research had said how the Duke of Ormonde had escaped to France. I didn’t think they had. Which left me wondering if he had made the crossing as a passenger aboard the Sally.

No doubt I was going to find out.

It was strange, knowing what I was seeing was history unfolding. How many historians would have paid money to walk in my shoes at this moment, I wondered? To be able to listen and watch while these men played their parts in a growing conspiracy, one that would lead in a few months to open rebellion?